I have just uploaded my transcription of the Key to Arnold's Latin Prose Composition which is meant to accompany G. G. Bradley's revision of T. K. Arnold's Latin textbook "A Practical Introduction to Latin Prose Composition." A 1908-edition (Longmans, Green & Co., London) of the textbook can be found at Archive.org.

I transcribed a scanned version of the following print edition of the Key:

a Textkit-user pointed out one typo and two errors (actual and clear errors in the Key itself) in my transcription (Thank you!). I have uploaded a corrected version of the Key to Arnold's Latin Prose Composition to my homepage. The errors are:

a Textkit-user pointed out an error (actually in the Key itself) in my transcription (Thank you!). I have uploaded a corrected version of the Key to Arnold's Latin Prose Composition to my homepage. The problems are:

Ex. 40, sentence 5: The 1885-"Key" has (a wrong) "expectatis", whereas a later version of this "Key" has the correct "expectamus".

a Textkit-user pointed out an error in my transcription and suggested the addition of footnotes to to sentences (Thank you!). I have uploaded a corrected version of the Key to Arnold's Latin Prose Composition to my homepage. The problems are:

a Textkit-user pointed out an error in the "Key" (part of an English sentence left untranslated) and suggested adding a footnote concerning a use of "fore" with future participle. I have uploaded a corrected version of the Key to Arnold's Latin Prose Composition to my homepage. The changes are as follows:

Ex. 48 B, sentence 6: I added the following footnote: "For "fore" see 36 in the textbook. A later key uses "esse" instead of "fore"."

Ex. 51, sentence 2: I added the following footnote: "The "Key" omits translating "from his uncle at Narbonne" in the English sentence. A newer "Key" adds "Narbone ab avunculo..." before "Massiliam ad...""

Thanks for this. Do you use any particular software programs for scanning and/or converting old text books to .pdf? It seems a monumental task to be scanning hundreds of pages; I imagine having remove the binding, cut loose the text pages, arrange, flip, etc. It sounds like a Herculean task! But then you may be one of the "Sons of Hercules" whose peplum movies used to thrill me as a kid?

Cathexis wrote:Carolus,
Do you use any particular software programs for scanning and/or converting old text books to .pdf? It seems a monumental task to be scanning hundreds of pages; I imagine having remove the binding, cut loose the text pages, arrange, flip, etc.

Hello Cathexis,

I am note quite sure what you are referring to. The pdf-files are only conversions of my main product, the transcribed text, mostly in html-format. I do not disassemble books, scan them, etc.

For my transcription projects I choose a text (book) and then enter the text in a plain text editor. However, while doing so I also add some simplified mark-up so that I can easily enter headings, italic, bold, footnotes. I am fairly good at blindtyping, but it still is definitely quite a bit of work. After entering the text I use a Python (computer language)-script to automatically create a temporary html-version, have it printed and then proofread the text, correct the text and create a final html-version (and for Gutenberg.org also a plain text version). In some cases I also create a pdf-version.

I have only ever tried creating a transcription based on an OCR/scanned text once: Pericla Navarchi Magonis. However, I found the process itself rather uncongenial and therefore switched back to my old process: "choose-transcribe-proofread-convert".

I guess that sometime in the future someone will create a programme which automatically creates digital transcriptions from scanned books fairly reliably, but I do not want to wait for that to come along. The future is created by working, not by waiting.

If I understand you right, you basically begin with an already scanned text?
If I misunderstood, mea culpa. I had asked because I was wondering how a
2-3 hundred page textbook ever makes into some digital format in the first
place? Hence, my wondering if I'd have to literally disassemble the book in
order to scan it. Yikes!